


It Certainly Took Them Long Enough

by cuddlemecrowley



Category: Supernatural
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Hogwarts, M/M, Snowball Fight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-15
Updated: 2013-08-15
Packaged: 2017-12-23 15:08:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/927945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlemecrowley/pseuds/cuddlemecrowley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean looks across the table and realizes he's in love with his best friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It Certainly Took Them Long Enough

They were in the library when Dean looked over at Cas and realized he was in love with his best friend.  
The sudden pounding of his heart, the shaking in his knees, and the instinct to _flee just run just go_ was nothing compared to the stuttering halt of his brain as he watched Castiel chew on his lip, the sudden and wild and crazy thought of _go kiss him_ lingering like a mist. He wanted to. Really, really, wanted to.

They were seventh-years, and at the nearing end of their last year in Hogwarts. Dean wanted to become an Auror—Castiel, an Animal Healer—and studying like crazy. They’d managed to get their usual corner, the quietest one where no one wandered because it was too far and too cold and after a few nasty rumors about what happens to people that go back there (faces ripped off, random Disapparation, sucked into a hole, etc.). They were the only ones there, especially since it was Christmas Eve, and it was snowing and cold and there were snowball fights to be had with Sammy and Gabe and probably something good to smuggle into the kitchens for. But there they were. Studying. On Christmas Eve.

And Dean discovered he had a huge crush on his best friend. Not just his best friend, but his closest friend. Everything sounded so third-year to call him just his “best friend” though, when really, Cas was the only one who comforted him, cajoled him into eating, distracted him when he felt himself spiraling—hell, even held him, not that he would ever bring it up ever—when John died. He kept Dean strong for Sammy, kept him from sobbing and screaming and killing someone when the blame was too high. Kept him sane and happy and whole. There was a lot that Dean would be grateful for, actually, and that thought collided into about a thousand others that were just as hard to digest. There was no reason for Cas to love him. No absolute reason for him to even reciprocate his friendship, even, so why would he fall in love with him? Dean was rude, lazy, and spent more time trying to get out of homework than doing it. He was moody and lashes out and has had detention more times than he could count, whereas Cas—kind Hufflepuff to the last—had only been once, for fighting back Michael that one time for beating up Sam. There was no reason for Cas to stoop to Dean’s level at all. 

The thought left him breathless, anxious, and he shuddered in his cold hard seat. He got up, stretched his legs, and with a sort of mumble about “finishing up” and “getting Sam something” and “bathroom.”

There was a six foot two coward and that was Dean Winchester.

Castiel looked on, silent, as his best friend left, mumbling something before leaving. He could hear the echo of his shoes, each soft thunk resounding in his heart. Castiel sighed, and leaned back, easing the tension between his shoulder blades. Dean was usually not such a mystery to him, to be honest. He’d slept in the same room with him for seven years, and it was hard not to be completely knowledgable in the Language of Dean. He was in love, or falling in love, and obviously Cas was not to know. A dead weight settled on his chest, constricting his breathing, as he thought about Dean holding someone else, smiling down at some girl, cupping her face and kissing her. Giving her a smile that was reserved for the people Dean was closest to. 

Castiel Novak, Hufflepuff and Charms extraordinare, felt like crying. 

Dean was _his_. But really, he never was his. Castiel couldn’t get to Dean the way Dean could to him, and sure, he might be fluent, he might be Dean’s best friend, but Dean was still a hard nut to crack, still hid everything in case he got hurt. Dean would never possibly want him back. He was skinny, too serious, with weird humor—and Dean really only liked people who smiled like he was their everything, really only liked people who knew how to ‘have a good time’ as he had explained it once. 

Castiel’s good time meant studying and looking at birds and reading. His was not a good time that Dean would enjoy. 

His shoulders slumped.

He needed to go outside. Get out, get away from this area, go out and play, go—

\--go do what? Forget Dean Winchester, his sole crush and best friend and the only person who made him feel halfway useful and good and like his decisions mattered and like he mattered? 

He needed to get out. 

He needed for anybody but his twin brother, Gabriel, who was Slytherin and beyond anyone’s rules, to find him sulking, cajoling him out of a funk before dragging him down, almost comically, to the yard by the lake, where Sam Winchester, blue scarf flying behind him as he ran, grinned and smiled and almost blushed when he saw him. Castiel knew about Gabriel and Sam, of course—everyone did. Dean wasn’t too happy about it—tended to think that Gabriel was going to get his brother hurt or in danger and _then when you do I’ll rip your fucking throat out ya hear?_ But to Dean’s surprise and maybe even his disappointment, they had been nothing but… sweet. In a teasing, biting sort of way that Cas couldn’t hope to understand. But they were definitely good together, and oddly, Sam seemed to have tempered Gabe a little bit, just as Gabriel made Sam bolder. 

So, naturally, as siblings and friends will do, they ended up attacking Cas with snowballs, pelting him until he fought back, ducking behind a snow-covered hedge that shook and rained down on him. He packed snow methodically, making sure it was stable before he chucked it, but he could tell his brother and Sam were closing in, cleverly using their very unfair advantage to come after him. He glanced back, trying to figure out where else he could go, but someone was in his way, crouching by him, and his eyebrows shot up (in that accursed owl-like look he apparently got) as Dean grinned back, mouth parted and turned up at the corner. “Ok, here’s the plan—I’ll take Gabe, you got Sam, got it?” 

“R-right.” 

Dean turned on his toes and began packing snow, but Cas could only stare at his back. Why was he here? “What happened to the girl you were meeting?” 

“What?” Dean looked around, but before he got more than a glimpse Cas’s shoulder was hit with a gleeful sound from Sam in the distance. 

He fought back, blush burning across his face, reprimanding himself for the question- stupid, stupid, _stupid_ Cas, he’s not going to talk about his girlfriends with you, what’s wrong with you—

“I wasn’t meeting a girl, Cas—oh, I got him, look at that, sucker!” Dean called out at Gabe, who shouted something back, but Dean was already adding, “I just needed to get out of there. Too much studying, you know?”

Cas nodded. They worked in relative silence, beating back their brothers as much as they could, and when Sam called it off because he was, finally, wet and tired, Cas and Dean met in the relative safety of the hedge, because Gabriel was still out there and could strike at any time. 

They sat shoulder to shoulder, panting a little at the effort of chucking balls of frozen water at their siblings. Cas could only stare at Dean and notice, as he had since he was eleven, the utter beauty of Dean, especially flushed with exertion, green eyes brighter than normal, and that smile that he gave to Cas, maybe _only_ to Cas. 

Everything stopped, just for a moment, as Cas weighed the pros and cons, examined the possible consequences, and mentally said ‘fuck that shit’ and leaned over and kissed him, lightly brushing before pulling back and looking at Dean’s eyes. In that length of time, which Cas could have measured by his pounding heart if he wanted to, he stared at Dean, gauging whether or not his wide open eyes meant that the kiss was good, was that bad, does he actually like me like that, what did I do wrong, oh no he _doesn’t_ like me, oh no—

But Dean only gasped brokenly, which prompted Cas to breathe again too, and grabbed Cas’s shoulders and kissed him back, deeper, harder, more desperately than Cas had. Cas melted, tensed; was charged with electricity, burning with something he hadn’t let himself dream for, and when they broke off in order to breathe, could only really squeak “wow.”

Gabriel, peeking over at another hedge, shrieked and ran back to the castle to tell Sam that _they’d finally done it, they’ve finally fucking hooked up, butterbeer and firewhiskey for everyone!!_


End file.
